Hope
by teamchaotixheroes
Summary: One should alway remain hopeful... even if all hope seems lost. Arcee has to keep hoping that her life will turn in a better direction even after losing so much.
1. Darkness

Darkness.

Darkness was all that she could see. Her audio receptors faintly pick up the sound of gunfire being shot and the sounds of impacts making contact. _'What happened?'_ her processor chimes. Her optics quickly come online as they glow a bright blue in realization of what happened. "We were attacked," she murmurs to herself. She and her crew were attacked by an unknown assailant for unidentified reasons. The femme stares straight out and sees the twinkling lights of hundreds of stars in the sky. Lying on her back, she starts to stand up only to find something has pinned her lower half to the ground.

She looks down before setting her optics on a piece of her ship covering her legs. A loud explosion rings within her audio receptors as she turns towards it. The femme sees a small dust cloud forming. _'I need to help my friends.' _She quickly grabs a hold of the debris and tries to pry it off of herself but to no avail. The Autobot struggles under the wreckage to free herself, only to have intense pain shoot through her body as she does. Her arms limply fall over her chassis in defeat. She arches her head to see if she can spot her comrades in the distance, hoping they will come to her aid. The femme stares up at the stars before her optics slowly close. She lets out a soft sigh as she prays to Primus that her friends are safe.

"Cee!" Her optics pop open at the voice calling out to her. She bends her neck around to see who that was that called out to her. "Arcee," calls the voice again. The femme merely rolls her optics at her obliviousness. The voice is coming from her com-link, "Arcee… What is your status?"

Arcee soon taps the side of her head opening up her com-link. "Nothing big… just stuck under some fallen debris," she half-chuckled at her response.

The voice on the other end, clearly a mech, chuckles before saying, "Don't worry, I have your coordinates. We'll be there as soon as-," his words were quickly cut off by the sound of gunfire. He shouts out another Autobot's name, nearly blowing out Arcee's audio receptors. He lets out a scream through the com-link, completely forgetting it was still open. "You'll pay for that bounty hunter!"

Arcee only could remain helpless underneath the debris of their crashed ship. She struggles even more at the thought of losing her comrades to some hunter who had been hired to deal with them. Her optics widen at the sounds of more gunfire, the scraping of metal punches, and even a couple of loud explosions. Her audio receptors pick up the mech pronouncing his battle cry, "You want the horns? You got'em!" She hears more of the fight and hopes and prays she will see her friend online. Suddenly her hope is shattered by the sound of her companion grunting in agonizing pain.

"No," she mouths to herself. She taps the side of her head, hoping her voice will travel across the frequency, "Cliffjumper."

No response.

"Cliffjumper… please answer," she pleads. The next thing she hears is what she can only guess as Cliffjumper's offline body falling to the ground. She closes her optics tight as a tear of energon slides down her face. Her watery optics slowly open at the sounds of approaching footsteps. She arches her head to try and see who is vastly approaching her position. All she is able to see is a tall mech coated in a silvery metal. She watches as he slowly comes to a halt in front of her. Her optics narrow as there is something eerily familiar about this mech.

The tall robot looks down at the fallen femme only with a smirk written on his face. He lefts up his left arm up before looking down at the _engine _upon it. The mech pushes a button on the engine as it seemingly begins to drain the silver coating into it and off the mech's body.

Her mouth slowly opens but no words come out as her optics widen as well. Arcee is stunned at the mech in front of her. Her shock soon fades as it is replaced by anger. She clenches her servo at what the mech did to her near the beginning of the war.

His optics glow a bright shade of orange as he smirks. "Arcee!" He reaches out to grab hold of the femme. "So glad to see… _you_." With that said the world turns to…

Darkness.

* * *

This story is basically a retelling of Tales of the Fallen Issue 6, pretty much the only comic I've read from the movie universe.  
Originally it was going to be about the twins and their ordeal, but turned into being about Arcee.  
And even then I wanted it to be a one-shot but it turned into a multichapter story.

So I hope you enjoy this story.


	2. Nothingness

Nothingness.

Arcee is in a dark void, completely devoid of any life. _'Did I rejoin the Matrix?' _She questions to herself. This void could not be the afterlife, the Matrix was suppose to contain all those that have passed on. There was only darkness… nothingness surrounds her.

'_If this isn't the Matrix… then where am I?' _Arcee looks around the space for something… anything but sadly finds none. She looks down at her chassis only to find her body is extremely damaged. Her optics widen at the sight of herself. _'What happened to me,'_ she tries to scream but comes out as a thought. She catches sight of her legs… or at least one of her legs. Her entire left leg has been removed while her right is barely hanging on. The knee-joint only dangles by a few cables as her stabilizing servo his cracked and misaligned with her leg. She looks at her arms, and like the legs, one is missing while the other is broken. Her right arm is completely gone from the socket and her left arm is merely floating by her side, not connected to her shoulder but there none the less.

Not wanting to look at the extents of the damage to her torso, her optics quickly look away. Curiosity and wonder got the best of her before she knew it, her optics were trailing towards her chest… what she saw only scared her to the brim of being offline.

Tubes, cables, and who knows what else connecting to her body, but that is not what terrified her. It was the small hole in the center of her chest… a place where a certain organ was contained. Her optics widen even further. _'My… s-spark… is g-gone.' _Arcee glances around the void for anything, again. After spotting nothing, she looks back towards her empty spark chamber. _'If my spark is gone… then I should be in the Matrix… the Allspark. This doesn't seem like the Well of All Sparks.' _She tries to see if she can move any of her remaining limbs but to no avail, they all seem like there are strapped down by an unknown force. Then again it could just be because of the damage to her body.

She looks out into the void, not searching for anything this time, just merely an unconscious action. _'How did I get here?' _ She tries to remember as her optics narrow at the thoughts. _'That's it!' _ Her optics widen at the memory. _'We received a message from… Optimus Prime. They were waiting for us, until…' _She narrows her optics at the thought. _'__**He**__ attacked us.'_

It was true, the mysterious mech's ship, the Death's Head, attacked the Autobot's shuttle and caused it to crash on the surface of an unknown planet. And now the rest is in the past, Arcee tries to clench her remaining servo but cannot move it an inch. She looks down to the ground… or at least below her in this nothingness of a void.

A tear of energon slips from her optic and slides down her metallic cheek to only fall into the void below. Her mind wanders to those who are no longer in this realm of existence… her team, Team Delta. Sure they were the typical team consisting of a leader, medic, scout, and finally the soldiers, but… they were not a family. She was the leader of the small ragtag group of Autobots and she looked out for each of them and they did the same. While they were not a family, there was one Autobot she would consider a brother and that was Cliffjumper.

'_Cliffjumper was always going out of his way to make sure I was okay.' _The Autobot was always making sure Arcee's plans went without a hitch. He always double checked if her back was safe from harm. _'Thanks to my carelessness… he is no longer with us.' _Another tear falls from her optic when her processor reminds her of the sound he made before. _'He was groaning in pain.'_ She told herself… it was her fault he was offline… it was her fault they were all dead… it was her fault that she was in this limbo of sorts. She was careless after receiving the Prime's message. Once they made contact with the Prime and joined his team, Optimus would take over position as leader. _'It's my fault… if I wasn't so careless, we would be near the planet that was now home to Optimus and his team.'_

'_We would be safe under the leadership and guidance of Optimus Prime.' _She slowly shuts her optics trying to imagine what her team would be like on Team Prime. _'Safer with Prime, Bumblebee, Ironhide, Jazz, and… especially Ratchet.' _Ratchet the only other mech, besides Cliffjumper, she would consider something more than a comrade in the Autobot ranks. _'Ratchet…' _she trails off with a look of relieve plastered on her face remembering their fateful encounter.

_In the battlefield, she had been injured and… she laid there in the bottom of a tunnel-like area. Arcee's only thoughts were she was going to go into stasis and finally go offline. That was until she heard the sounds of wheels scraping upon the steel ground. And that was when she saw him… the medic._

_The vehicle slowly came to a halt before it quickly transformed into its robot form. The mech looked down at the damaged femme with concern in his optics. The Autobot kneeled beside her and surveyed her injuries. From the corner of his optic, he saw the dread in her optics wondering the extent of her damage._

"_Am I," she started, "going to go off-"_

_He quickly cut her off by saying, "No. Your damage is only minimal." The mech watched as she laid her head upon a large rock with a look of relief on her face. The Autobot began his work, reconnecting cables, fixing broken wires, and helped other areas that require medic assistance. After fixing her up, he let out a soft sigh before he asked, "So you got a name, soldier?"_

"_Arcee," she paused as she stared at him, "uh… sir."_

_The medic simply raised up an optic ridge and a digit before saying, "Don't call me sir, I work for a living." He said in a tense voice before he chuckled a bit and finished in a friendly tone, "Name's Ratchet." The Autobot smiled, "Got that?"_

_Arcee smiled back at the medic before answering, "Yes sir… uh, Ratchet." The two stared into each others' optics and that was when she felt a spark in her chest. She let out a soft gasp and her optics shifted towards a different direction from his. Her optics slowly began to trail towards Ratchet's form. Arcee soon spotted the medic fidgeting with his digits around his servos and his optics were looking in another direction as well. The femme gingerly moved a servo towards the medic's fidgeting servos. She tentatively placed her servo over his and felt them tense a bit. "Ratchet is something wrong?"_

_His servos relaxed as his face turned back to hers. "No… it's… uh, I need to get you out of here."_

_Her optics looked away. "Oh," she said a little disappointed, "right."_

"_Think you can stand up?" he asked her. Ratchet saw her nod before he started to help her up off the ground. The medic slung her arm over his neck to help her out of the area. They slowly began to walk through the dark, narrow pathway. The two do not say anything to one another just occasionally stealing a glance towards the other._

_Arcee turned to face Ratchet, only to see him look away. She looked away in disappointment. Before long, she wanted to talk to him even if it was just small talk. The femme clenched her lose fist with a look of determination. She opened her mouth to say something, "Ra-"_

_Ratchet quickly began talking before she could start. "So… Arcee," he paused a bit trying to find the right words to say. He saw the anticipation in her optics and only became flustered. "Uh… How are you feeling?"_

_Her expression returned to normal before replying, "Fine… I suppose." Once again, the awkward silence descended upon the two Autobots. She let out a sigh before the look of determination returned. "So… Ratchet," Arcee began just as Ratchet had, "W-What did you do before this whole mess started?"_

_The 'Bot snapped his head around to look directly towards her and said, "No one's ever asked that since the war started." A look of bliss filled his face as he remembered the times before the war. "Well," he started with a smile on his face, "I was just a simply medic… only helping those with minimal injures. And letting the professionals deal with the larger cases."_

"_Wow," she responsed. Arcee smiled in the fact that she was genuinely impressed with the medic but also because they were talking._

"_And what about you?" he asked her, "You must have done something before the war?"_

"_Yeah… before the war," she started before looking downward. "I was a regular civilian about to go into the field of teaching." Her head started to droop at the thought. "I was going to be a teacher… educating young 'Bots about everything you could think of. And after they would graduate my class… I wanted to feel a sense of pride knowing I helped them in their development and growth. But thanks to this war… I'll never know what that feels like."_

_After hearing Arcee's story, Ratchet gradually placed a reassuring servo on her shoulder. He smiled as she turned to face him. "You know this war isn't going to last forever," he said trying to sound comforting. "Once it's over, you'll be able to become that teacher. And even if it doesn't happen, I'm sure you'll have sparklings of your own." Before he could continue, his optics widen towards Arcee's reaction._

_Her optics widen at the mere mention of the word 'sparklings.' She quickly looked away from Ratchet. "S-Sparklings," Arcee mumbled to herself. The femme's face became flush at the thought of her having offspring. Her optics slowly trailed back towards Ratchet's face, only to see him looking nervous._

"_U-Uh, what I mean is… i-if you did have sparklings," he saw her look away again. "I-I think you c-could still fill your desire to help t-them in their d-development and growth. I-I'm sure you would feel a g-greater sense of pride coming from y-your s-sparklings." He stated nervously, not sure if he worded it right or if he should have keep his mouth shut._

_Arcee's optics slowly resumed staring into Ratchet's. "I s-suppose," she said as her spark starts pulsing faster with each nanoclick that passed._

_The two chuckled nervously, not knowing what to say after this. Suddenly from the corner of their optics, they saw a faint glimmer of light. They smiled towards one another before they started walking a little faster towards the illumination._

_Arcee slowed her step a bit, with a thought in the back of her processor. Once they exited the tunnel, they would go their separate ways. She frowned at the thought of saying goodbye._

_They continued forward to the tunnel's exit. Ratchet soon noticed the eagerness leave Arcee and her steps are not as fast. Right before the way out, he stopped and faced her. "Arcee is something wrong?" he asked with a caring tone._

_It was now or never. If she did not say anything, they would depart never seeing each other again. If she did say something, it still did not guarantee she would be with him. But still it never hurts to try… does it? She faced him and saw the look of concern written on his face. Maybe there is a chance. Arcee smiled warmly towards the medic as her chest pulsed again. "Ratchet I-"_

"_Well what do we have here?" said a voice that cut the femme off._

'_**Him.**__'_ Her little flashback comes to an abrupt end before the anger she feels at the mere thought of him boils in her processor. _'That mech ruined my time with Ratchet… and now he's here.' _Her mind filling to the brim with rage, so much she fails to notice the little gleam sparking within her chest cavity.

The little shimmer beings glowing which continues to be ignored by Arcee's anger. The glow intensifies as it gradually begins to expand. It is no longer the small gleam but is in fact a good sized orb.

Arcee soon feels a pulse within herself. She slowly looks down to her empty spark chamber… except it is not empty. Her optics nearly pop out of their sockets at what she sees her _spark. 'How is this possible? It was extinguished and now my spark is pulsing again.' _This did not make any sense to her… there was never a record of a spark going out only to be reignited later. She looks around the void for a time, wondering if this truly was limbo. Soon a thought approaches her mind, _'Maybe… I'm just in stasis and my processor created this world for me to stay in. If so… why?' _

Her mind wraps around the question, wondering if she really was offline or simply in stasis lock. Suddenly her mind is no longer looking for an answer but instead it senses a pain coming from her spark. _'Why is-' _she is cut off by a feeling of something tugging at her spark. _'Why is my spark-' _another shot of pain cuts her off. Arcee quickly looks down to her chest only to see her spark pulsing brighter and brighter, acting like it is struggling to stay put.

Arcee's optics only watch in horror as her spark is losing its battle to stay put. Slowly her spark gradually slips away from her chest cavity. Her optics widen at the sight of her spark being ripped from her spark chamber.

Her spark slowly floats near her face and beings floating side to side as if some unknown force is triumphantly gloating over removing her spark. The spark slowly drifts away from her chassis but comes to an abrupt halt. It soon begins to rumble in place as if it is about to self-destruct before it shoots away, leaving a glowing trail behind it.

The femme watches as it shoots away from her. Her mind is racing with questions, she knows she cannot answer. Her optics watch as the glowing trail traverses the void before it fades in the distance. Arcee's line of sight slowly starts to get hazy. Her optics' bright blue color begins to dim with every nanoclick that passes. She tries desperately to regain focus but feels them beginning to lose energy. Arcee closes her optics as a tear slides out knowing what is about to befall her. _'I guess… now it's my time.' _Her thoughts race one last time on the special mechs that were once a part of her life, going from Cliffjumper to Ratchet and vice versa until finally settling into…

Nothingness.

* * *

In chapter two, you see a little of Arcee's past.  
And yes, I ship the ArceexRatchet pairing... from G1 to Animated to the movies. The only universe I don't ship them in is in Prime, I ship her with Bulkhead there.

Anyway after finishing this chapter I felt like I should have included a past story with Cliffjumper. But at this point, he's dead and will only briefly be mentioned again. But then again, plans could change, they always do don't they... I originally only wanted a summary of Arcee's time with Ratchet but it turned into nearly a full blown flashback... it's half the chapter.

Lastly I've started on chapter three but haven't finished it. So I don't know how long of a wait it'll be.  
Sorry in advance.


End file.
